Clap When You Land (2020)

I picked up this book knowing little about it, but I came away loving it. Despite the strong YA-ness of it in places, it tells its story beautifully and rounds the characters out in really compelling ways.

Camino and Yahaira live in two different worlds. Camino lives in a small village in the Dominican Republic, where she helps her aunt, the local healer, and waits for her dad in the U.S. to call her on video chat. Yahaira, also Dominican, is a former chess champ living in New York with her parents. However, both girls become bound together through a tragedy, a crashed plane making its way from New York to the Dominican Republic, and neither will ever be the same again.

I’ll start by admitting that the plot itself isn’t terribly revolutionary. Not sure about younger readers, but I myself figured out where things were heading pretty early on. But this book is a great example of the principle “it’s not what you do, it’s how you do it,” because the predictable notes within it really don’t detract from my interest in the book at all. Even when I guessed what was going to happen, I was still invested in the characters and how they were going to react as events moved along.

Both Camino and Yahaira are wonderfully drawn. We see the universal touchstones between them in the midst of how different the trappings of their lives are. In the differences between them, huge elements of privilege and opportunity are at play. On the island, Camino knows what a slender thread of protection separates her from Xero, a predatory man who’s known for conscripting girls her age for sex work, and she dreams of getting away to the States and joining her dad when she goes to college. But the dangerous and frightening parts of Camino’s life don’t mean that Yahaira’s life in New York is thus painless and easy, just as Yahaira’s more fortunate upbringing by comparison doesn’t mean that Camino’s life is nothing but poverty and struggle. The book allows the lives of both girls to be nuanced and complicated, and as more ties are drawn between them, those complexities weave themselves into stunning patterns.

Author Elizabeth Acevedo writes the book entirely in free verse poetry, hopping between the Dominican Republic and New York as the girls take turns on leading the narrative. The way it’s written reminds me a little of a sung-through musical, in that there are a couple distinct varieties of narrative style within the poetry. Some feel like distinct thematic pullouts, a “break” from the action to explore ideas captured through introspective monologues while still threading in elements of the plot (for a musical comparison, think “Green Finch and Linnet Bird” from Sweeney Todd or “I Don’t Know How to Love Him” from Jesus Christ Superstar.) Others are more plot-driven, moving the story forward in a way that still incorporates the beauty/musicality of the poetic devices Acevedo uses (like “Aaron Burr, Sir” from Hamilton or “Happy New Year” from RENT.) In order to tell a story while taking full advantage of the poetic writing style, you need both kinds, and Acevedo balances the two with a deft hand.

Warnings

Sexual content (mostly discussed/implied rather than shown,) language, scenes of violence (including sexual assault,) and strong thematic elements.

Other Doctor Lives: Watership Down: Episode 2 – “The Raid” (2018)

Another Doctor, another miniseries. We’re following Peter Capaldi this time around, although I’m not positive how many episodes he’ll be featured in – it appears that the entire voluminous cast is credited for every episode, and I already discovered that Capaldi isn’t in episode 1. But for now, let’s get started.

A group of rabbits, led by All-Around-Decent-Guy Protagonist Hazel, have left their warren after Hazel’s little brother has a prophetic dream of death and destruction. They’ve arrived at Watership Down, where they’ll make their new home, but there’s only one doe among them and they know they’ll need a greater gender balance to survive. Hazel hesitantly leads a raid on a nearby farm to liberate their does, while another subset of the group gets more than they bargained for investigating a nearby warren called Efrafa.

I know I read the book at some point, but it was a long time ago and I think I was a little too young at the time to really get it. I just remember that it’s about a lot of rabbits with adorable names who spend much of their time dealing with inter-/intrawarren power struggles, there’s all kinds of rabbit mythology, and it’s incredibly violent. As such, my memories of the book don’t give me much to go on as to what’s ahead other than a vague notion that this animated miniseries (a Netflix original) appears to be pulling its punches on some of the violence. Certainly, violent things happen, but we usually “cut away” before the critical moment, and I feel like we probably ought to have seen at least one dead rabbit by now.

The animation, in my view, suffers under the same issue that The Lion King reboot did. Going for more realistic-looking CGI instead of a more stylized animation (CGI or 2D – doesn’t matter) presents two problems. First, there are serious limits to how well the rabbits can emote onscreen, and while the voice cast gives it their all, the effect is muted when the animation isn’t matching what they’re putting out. Second, most of the rabbits basically look alike, and unlike The Lion King, there are a ton of them with prominent roles to try and keep track of. Even two episodes in, I rarely know who’s onscreen until I recognize the actors’ voices.

At least there, we have plenty to work with. This cast is almost comically stuffed with talented British actors. Leading the pack is James McAvoy as Hazel, an everyrabbit who’s doing his best to hold things together in the face of enormous odds on all sides. We’ve also got Nicholas Hoult (who I’ve seen in all kinds of things now but who I love best as Nux in Mad Max: Fury Road) as Hazel’s little brother Fiver and John Boyega as Bigwig, an alpha-rabbit-type who keeps challenging Hazel’s leadership. And then, you ready? Because this cast features Ben Kingsley, Gemma Arterton, Olivia Colman, Mackenzie Crook (Gareth from the U.K. version of The Office,) Anne-Marie Duff (Fiona from the original Shameless,) Freddie Fox (who played the titular character in a good adaptation of The Mystery of Edwin Drood,) Daniel Kaluuya, Rosamund Pike, and Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje (Mr. Eko from Lost.) Phew!

And where’s Peter Capaldi in all this? As you can see, he’s one of the few actors not playing a rabbit. Instead, he’s Kehaar, a bird that the group comes upon and tries to enlist in their search for more does. Kehaar gives off Big Tool Energy in all his scenes, making petty demands of the rabbits while having no intention of doing anything that doesn’t help himself. In the role, Capaldi does a fine job of making Kehaar delightfully terrible.

First impressions:

Accent Watch

Scottish. So Scottish.

Recommend?

In General – Not necessarily. The excellent voice cast is turning in good work, in my view, for not a whole lot of reward, and even though I don’t remember much of the book, I can’t shake the feeling that this miniseries isn’t doing it justice.

Peter Capaldi – Possibly. I’m getting a kick out of selfish, irritable Kehaar so far. We’ll see how much Capaldi ends up being in it altogether.

Warnings

Lots of violence against rabbits, disturbing images, and strong thematic elements.

Relationship Spotlight: Pray Tell & Blanca Evangelista (Pose)

In any show about a found family, relationships are going to be critical, and there are plenty of relationships to love on Pose. But I think my favorite is probably the friendship between Blanca and Pray Tell (a few spoilers.)

Even though Pray Tell is the emcee for the balls and ostensibly meant to dole out praise and shade indiscriminately, he has a soft spot for the Evangelistas from the beginning, especially for Blanca. When Blanca doesn’t have the funds to match the high fashions of Elektra’s house, she turns to Pray Tell for some custom designs and regular advice. He’s the first person she tells about being HIV+, and when Pray Tell in turn tests positive himself, she’s the one he confides in. They share their dreams and fears with one another, their relationship woes, their ball strategies, and their plans for disrupting the systems of discrimination that are holding them back. In short, they’re friends and confidantes.

And, as friends, it’s natural that they fight. Each is both highly-opinionated and very protective of the other, and there are moments on the show when either finds themselves in a spiral of self-pity, unwilling to listen to the other’s well-meaning advice and encouragement. When they have a real knockdown dragout battle of wills, over Pray Tell’s relationship with Ricky, it gets ugly fast. As two dramatic people on a show filled with dramatic people, tempers flare quickly, and Blanca righteously rages while Pray Tell defends and accuses.

But while those clashes between them are significant, their relationship is much more frequently characterized by support. They keep one another accountable in their HIV treatments, taking turns to build one another up in low moments. Blanca frequently has Pray Tell’s back when he starts getting involved in Act Up protests and other AIDS-related causes, and he offers her counsel when she faces obstacles trying to get her own nail salon off the ground.

One thing that I really like about both characters and how they operate together is how seriously both take their responsibilities as elders. The concept of elders is important in both the Black and Latinx communities, as well as the LGBTQ community, particularly in connection with struggle – the pioneers who’ve paved the way and are trying to guide the younger generations through an environment that’s hopefully a little kinder than the one they came up in. Even though Blanca is quite a bit younger than Pray Tell and Elektra’s generation, her position as a house mother means she takes on an elder role in the community (and I suppose in a community dogged by family rejection, employment and housing discrimination, hate crimes, and now disease, people grow up fast.) Blanca and Pray Tell both look to offer protection, support, and wisdom to the younger people coming up in the balls. And that means advising them on their fashions and their voguing, yes, but it also means encouraging them to go after their dreams, setting standards for them to live by, and trying to keep them safe in a world that seems out to get them. While other house mothers seem to be in it maintain to acquire acolytes and win trophies at the balls, Blanca is in it to nurture and shepherd, and even though Pray Tell doesn’t head up a house of his own, he looks out for the young men in his circle, trying to teach them about everything from love to safety to skincare. I love whenever Pray Tell and Blanca take on a new project together to help the “children” or teach them a new lesson, because I know there’s little stopping the two of them when they put their minds together.